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Story:Kings of Strife/Part 53
Part Fifty-Three Their truck rolled through the night on the abandoned road leading to the end of the nation. Even in the almost-midnight air, the environment around them rose gently and fell with even more grace, and the snow blanketing every inch of the land was the only light from all over. The moon was absent. The more westward they went, the more the lands wore their damage with pride: dry craters, collapsed towers and houses, fallen and stripped trees crooked like shattered spines. The most telling scar was the silence. For the entirety of their drive – and for the entirety of the journey Vik and his friends had been taking to the west – Shorica was silent, even in the empty ruins of wayward towns and isolated villages. A drop of moisture landed on Vik’s nose. He let it melt into the air again. He had been clenching one eye closed for the entire ride, and the other looked out to watch the country as they passed it by. “It’s snowing,” Karilyn whispered, her body moving slightly as she reached a hand up to hold a slowly falling snowflake. A childish joy she had never exhibited before shone through her hushed voice. The rest of the caravan was either silent or asleep. “Look, Scarface. It’s snowing. Does it snow in Nneoh?” He chuckled deeply, despite himself. “Yes. In the mountains by the south. I climbed one of them, so I’m no stranger to this.” “Really? You climbed a mountain? Was it fun?” Vik frowned, remembering the gambit that was his journey on Mount Gulg and the ruin that its aftermath had brought to his life and his career. “Not really. My life was kind of in danger the whole time.” “…Oh. Well. I’m sorry about that.” She lowered her hand. He laughed again, smiling despite everything. “It’s okay. It’s in the past now. And it was fun. Not everyone can say they’ve done a lot of things I have.” “That’s true. I don’t know anyone else who can make fire come out of their eyes like you can.” “That’s not one of the things I’m thankful for, unfortunately.” “Haha! I’m just teasing you, Scarface, you know that.” She looked up at him from her spot on his shoulder, her eyes smiling like he had never seen before. Vik felt his heart start to beat harder, and he suddenly became conscious of how close the two were. At some point during the long truck ride, Karilyn had went from sitting next to him to slouching in her seat and letting her head lean on his shoulder. He gulped and looked away to the country again. “I miss the snow,” she said after a few minutes, when her head had fallen onto his shoulder again. He could feel her breathing slowly, at peace, as if they were not riding toward a city that could be their tombs. “It would always snow at home, in south Inusia, where my family used to live. I remember spending every winter holiday reading with my dad while the snow piled up outside of our little glass door. Once a week, dad would go sledding with my brothers and I before dinner, and we’d come back in to mom cooking dinner for us. Sometimes it’d be my favorite: eggplants and rice with yellow beans. On those nights, dad would always let Korus have a beer, and we’d laugh louder than ever.” She shifted again, bringing her furry mantle closer around her shivering shoulders. “That was a long time ago. Before the Civil War in Nneoh. Before my parents separated.” “I’m sorry,” Vik responded, quiet and unsure of what else he could say. “That sounds like a wonderful memory, though. Your father sounds like a great man.” “He was. Mother left him for a rich older man that wasn’t a soldier. She said she couldn’t live with… what happened.” “What happened? What do you mean?” “…My older brother died in the Civil War. He and my dad both fought… and only my dad came back. Mom blamed him for it. He would never tell me that, but I knew, even then.” “…Oh.” Vik inhaled sharply and blinked. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.” “No, it’s okay, Scarface.” She looked up to him again from beneath her eyelashes. “What’s your dad like?” Vik looked down to his feet and tried not to close his eyes. He knew he would see a face that would wound him if he let himself hide in darkness. “Strong. A military man, too. Very strict. He… made me join the army when I was of age. He and I weren’t very close.” Even now, after he had left the man to die – especially after that – Vik felt the cold, piercing sapphire gaze of his father on his back. “I’m sorry.” She wrapped a hand around his arm and squeezed his bicep. “It’s alright. Dads suck, anyways. Mine… When I began to work for Inusia, he cursed me out and disowned me. Said he raised me better than to follow in his footsteps. I’ve always wanted to make the world a better place, or just to find something I was good at… but he wouldn’t listen. He just sold our old home and found a place in Inusia City. Some nice apartment, I bet. He never gave me the address. He just… left. I haven’t heard from him in a few years now.” She slouched further and gripped Vik’s arm with both of her own, sighing as she snuggled closer. “I hope he’s alright in all this mess. I miss him.” Vik had nothing to say in response, so he glanced down at Karilyn before feeling his blood run cold. A memory pierced him – a shameful memory, of one of the weakest, most horrid moments of his life. A moment he had tried extremely hard to forget. Something brought it on, he realized, trying not to move or disturb the woman next to him. Inusia City. Why did that make his heart beat so quickly? Inusia City – he had been there, once, when fleeing the Mirage Tower after meeting Silverius again, at what felt like years and years ago. Vik remembered the robbery they did, to survive. Their fleeing from the city. Silverius effortlessly picking a lock. Vik killing a man on accident. Before that, Vik holding onto a portrait of a family with identical, beautiful red hair. Hair like the fire of his Crystal… hair like the woman’s on his arm. ‘No. No, it cannot be. There just… There is just no way. No. I can’t believe it. I won’t believe it.’ The exact memory of the portrait went further in his consciousness the more he blinked and struggled to calm his breathing, even more persistently than the image of his father’s disappointed gaze. The woman – he could see her now, clearly, just as clearly as he could see the woman on his arm now. Vik knew it to be true, though he wanted nothing more than to deny it with all his heart. Karilyn Red was in a portrait in the house that Vik and Silverius had broken into in Inusia City, the same house in which Vik had killed a man. ‘I killed her father, and my own.’ He could not move or take her off his arm. She was sleeping now, as was everyone else in the back carriage of the broken down truck. Cidolas drove in the front, silent as ever. Karilyn stirred slightly, and Vik remembered the last time someone had slept on him. It was the last time he slept with Jütenas Kinandorf. He wondered if they were still alive, with Vainia or in the city. He cried silently until the silhouette of Shorekeep loomed, darker than even the sky. The caravan began to buzz with activity as the majestic city grew before them like a giant. The silver-cloaks rose and yawned and started to reload and prepare their weapons. Karilyn continued to doze, and Vik wiped his tears gently enough to keep the woman on his arm in her peaceful slumber. “You said you had a plan,” someone said, drawing Vik’s attention to the activity of the caravan again. “Something to do with the airships. What is it?” It was the brown-haired boy with two pistols in his lap that spoke, his small hazel eyes boring into Vik’s. The city was closer now, but they had long since deviated from the road that led to the walls of the city and a likely roadblock or checkpoint. Cidolas was driving to the sea and the cliffs that the great city stood on. Vik cleared his throat and looked over the young boy in front of him. How could someone so young really be a soldier riding to a city full of enemies, and still show such indominable determination in his eyes? “Right. I… I can take out the airships, I think. I just need to know where they are, and to get to them without being caught. How many were there?” “Only three, from what I saw. They’re not flying around now, so they’re likely in Lady Vainia’s shipyard.” The boy looked Vik over. “I’m Shinten Asuka. I’m from Mortis, just like Lady Vainia.” He pushed his hand out to shake Vik’s. The Nneonian complied. “Vikcent Hyusei. Nice to meet you.” He hoped against hope that he would be able to see the boy again, even if that was an unrealistic hope. “So how are you going to do it? You don’t even have any weapons on you. Are you an explosions expert or something?” Shinten Asuka nodded to the dark-skinned woman in the caravan, who was helping organize supplies with Moritaka right behind Cidolas in the driver’s seat. “We have one of those, too. Maybe she should go with you.” “No. You all need all the help and manpower you can get, I think.” Vik felt the pulsing of his Crystal wrapped in the pockets of his pants. Though he only had the lavender scarf around his neck to protect him from the elements, he momentarily felt exceedingly hot. “I have… a power. One I can’t necessarily explain.” He frowned at the somber knowledge of what he had done at Icarun, and against Silverius. To do what was necessary, he would definitely have to draw upon that uncontrollable power again, and those black flames felt likely to char his soul this time. “A power? Like Lady Vainia?” Vik looked up. “Something like that. I’m not very experienced with it, though. What have you seen of Vainia’s power?” Shinten shrugged and looked off to the black sea motionless to their side. “I’ve only heard stories of it, mostly from fellow Mortisian refugees. How she made massive weapons and hundreds of knives to defend herself. How she saved the lives of hundreds by making constructs and boats out of her powers. How she makes the impossible happen. If it wasn’t for her and her powers, the entire palace and everyone in Grainis would have been killed, without a doubt.” “Huh? Killed? Why?” “…How haven’t you heard? Where have you been in the past three months?” Shinten frowned and fingered his pistols. He looked more like a child the more uncomfortable he grew. “The Feast of Men. After Lady Vainia returned to her home nation after the failure of Icarun, she was betrothed to a noble and a feast was held in honor of their betrothal some time after she returned. But she was betrayed by the Inusians backing her parents, the King and Queen, and Inusian airships bombed the entire palace. Everyone was killed but Vainia and the people she personally saved.” Shinten sighed. “It was that heroic act of hers that influenced me to join her forces in the first place. Mortis had always been the Empire’s bitch, everyone knows that… but that was too much. They took it too far.” Vik was stunned silent from awe and sympathy. He couldn’t imagine having to deal with something like that… yet, at the thought of a father and a mother, he remembered his own crimes and his own faults. His eyes lowered and he felt a pang in his heart. ‘Where would I get off condemning a betrayal, when I betrayed my own blood?’ Karilyn shifted and sighed in her sleep. ‘And, speaking of betrayal…’ Shinten was about to turn around and continue preparing, but Vik raised his hand and grabbed the boy’s attention again when the truck entered a cliffside tunnel shrouded in darkness. “Hold on. You all were in the city already, right? All the way in the palace?” “Hm? Yeah. We were driven out by the Inusians already. We lost our last Leader there.” “…What about the Barons? The Council? Were they there, or did they go east with Vainia?” Shinten’s eyebrows knitted together in thought. “I don’t know. We saw a bunch of refugees crammed in the throne room, but I didn’t see any Barons or anything. I don’t remember where they went. We were being shot at, dude.” He shrugged and turned away. Vik wasn’t sure if he was to feel relieved or not, but he was sure that there was a chance the Baron of Foreign Affairs still lived. Vik wondered if they would ever meet again. ‘If you’re alive, and here… I only ask that you stay safe. I want to return this to you… and to thank you.’ He gripped onto the scarf with his right hand, absentmindedly jostling Karilyn and startling her out of her rest. She looked up at him with tired, familiar eyes. Those same eyes looked up at him the same way as the caravan stopped at the tunnel leading up to Vainia’s shipyard. Moritaka had the entire underground tunnel complex memorized, apparently, and the way to the innards of the Queen’s castle was more than a few miles down the dark, narrow roads. Vik and Karilyn stood alone near a ladder leading up into the dark world above, and the caravan of silver-cloaks looked away from them respectfully. “You’ll be safe out there, won’t you, Scarface?” She fingered her fur mantle and alternated looking up at him and down to her feet. “I know you’ll be using that power of yours. The flames. Only, I won’t be there to watch your back this time.” “I’ve been getting better at it. Stronger. I can feel it. Even that fight with Silverius helped… and my wounds from it are healed already. I’ll be fine.” That was a bit of a lie, as his chest still stung when the cold wind blew against him, but Karilyn was better off not knowing that. “I guess so. I just… I don’t know. I’ve seen too much, especially with you guys already. This is all too much… but it’s real now. This is all real.” “…How do you think I feel?” “Now’s not the time for jokes, Scarface. People are dying.” She looked up to him and frowned, crossing her arms beneath her breasts. As hard as he tried, Vik couldn’t keep himself from noticing every move Karilyn made, hyperaware of every shift and every dance of her eyes. He knew she looked at him the same way. When did all of this happen? How did they get into this position? Was it him saving her life, or the two of them realizing – perhaps unconsciously – that they had both lost everything? He frowned deeply, feeling childish for the beating of his heart and the warming of his face. “I know, Karilyn. I don’t want you to die. Or anyone else. That’s why I’m going out to fight. That’s why I’m accepting this power.” ‘I couldn’t save Rosaria, or my father. I can save you… and maybe Jutenas, too.’ She stepped closer to him, close enough to startle him and heat him up more than the Crystal of Flame ever could. “You can’t die, either. We’re going to see each other again. You and me and Blondie. We’re... we’re going to stick together. Right, Scarface?” ‘No more false promises. No more lies.’ Vik gulped, and felt nervous sweat start to run down from his armpits down the side of his chest. He reached out and took both of Karilyn’s hands, squeezing them for comfort. “Right. After I finish this, I’ll see you all at the castle. I promise. Go give them hell, Red.” She smiled at him and bit her lip shyly. “You too, Scarface. Literally.” He let go of her hands and couldn’t suppress the smile rising on his own cheeks. “See you soon.” Then the truck was gone, and so was she. Vik’s smile faded as quickly as it had rose, and he turned, still hyperaware of the dirty lavender scarf around his thick neck. He kept silent as he rose up the ladder leading to the innards of the shipyard, and tried his best to ignore the rising heat of the cursed artifact on the side of his leg. The tunnel lead to the main part of the airship yard, right in between two massive battleships of wood and steel. The night was as black as he could have expected; no stars, no shades of midnight or violet, only the dark and the shadow. Tall stalks of masts rose like the leafless trees that they had left behind in the west part of the countryside, all wood and rope and stark white slivers of cloth cutting the dark like knives. He could hear the creaking of footsteps distantly, but for the most part, the area seemed deserted and not under high alert. Tar and the smell of wood and metal played with his nostrils as he stalked around the shadows of the ships. He hadn’t been on an airship since Icarun, and the thought of that disastrous time sent shivers running down his spine. So many had died, burned, been shot, or drowned in the churning whirpools and cliffs below… and even more would die here, when he bombed the ships and killed the Inusians as planned. ‘No. It isn’t about killing anymore. It’s about saving. Protecting.’ He kept the faces of Karilyn and Jutenas in the back of his mind as he started to climb the side of the battleship that seemed the least populated. His plan was to climb as high as he could before slamming down to the ground like he had when confronting Silverius at the shores of the center of Shorica, engulfed in flames and destroying as much of the wooden infrastructure as he could. If he could act fast and without being detected, he would be able to get away without much of a firefight, hopefully. The Corps had given him a spare automatic pistol, but it wouldn’t do much against two fully armed crews of the battleships. Luckily the shadows camouflaged him as he climbed higher, higher, higher. The higher he went, the more the cold, bitter winds from the sea cut through his bones and his mind. Every passing thought was cut short by a reminder of the cold, and of his duty. Duty. Was that what he told himself he had to do, back when he climbed Mount Gulg? What about when he climbed the Mirage Tower, in the middle of the Inusian Desert, where no man had ever returned before? Was it his duty to serve in Vainia’s army, and fight alongside walking dead men above the seas of the Queen’s Gulf? Who was his duty to? What duty was he acting on? Nneoh’s? Shorica? Himself? They were lies, all of them, and he knew it. There never was any duty. There never was anything he had to do, never any obligations bigger than himself. They were lies. Even Silverius knew he was lying to himself, from the very beginning. He had said it to Vik’s face and he didn’t listen, even after Karilyn’s father was dead on the ground thanks to Vik believing his own lies. ‘My duty has always been myself. I have always fought for the people I care about… even when I once cared about myself. I have always been selfish. I have always been self-serving, even at the expense of others.’ He reached the top of the ship’s mast and he wept. He thought of everyone that had died beneath his watch and he wept. It had begun with his squad and it had ended with Rosaria and his father. No – it had not ended. Not if he couldn’t act here. Not if he didn’t lose himself in the power as he needed to. Not if he didn’t let the Crystal take over him and gift him with the power of the flames. He was one of the Chosen – but chosen for what? For suffering? For power? Why him? Scarlet and black heart began to swirl up and throughout his veins as he let himself mourn the ones he had loved and lost. The power was familiar by now, but he had never gotten used to the feeling of burning and not having any actual wounds. He had never gotten used to the knowledge that no one could stop him. But he had to – control, use, consciousness, duty… the words meant nothing. All that mattered was the strength, his strength, and the fire bursting from his veins. ‘I cannot fail. I will not. Not anymore. Not on my name as a Hyusei. As a Hero.’ He opened his eyes and felt the power exuding from them. Vik looked down at himself and smiled with primal satisfaction as the warmth embraced him again. Black flames rose out of every pore and floated over everything he wore. His hand reached out to a nearby mast pole to help himself stand, and the flames quickly licked up through the wood and onto the cloth. The smell of smoldering heat arrested him… and then, a sound of great heat rising took him by surprise again. He glanced over, flames covering his vision and his consciousness, and forced himself to remain in his own skin to take in what he had noticed. Smoke was rising from the dark castle in the distance, just in front of the sea. The others must have reached their destination, and were taking action. His time had come. ‘So be it. I will burn, if I must.’ He looked down to the ships and the shipyard far, far below him. He opened his eyes wide yet let himself stop seeing – he let the flames rise, rise, igniting even his hair, making every nerve stand on edge and scream in satisfaction. He let go of the smoldering wood around him, he pushed off from the crow’s eye that he was kneeling upon, and he let the wind rush past him as he descended. Like a comet, Vik became the fire, and he soared down to the unseeing world below him. The explosion from his landing was larger than he imagined, and the resulting satisfactory power that flowed through him was more satisfying than he had ever experienced. Already he could smell the cooking of flesh and the burning of wood. Everywhere he looked, life and limb was extinguished. He had landed at the very bottom of the ship, in the middle of a sleeping barrack. He could only barely see – everything was black and smoldering. He only heard glimpses of screams and the rattling of gunfire. He felt none of it. Feeling only heat, not even shame or sorrow anymore, Vik exhaled, held his arms out, and opened his eyes to the fire. The next thirty minutes were a blur of screams, movement, and fire. Everything screamed, even the metal and the earth, and everything burned. He could feel them burning. He knew when something was dead, and when it would burn no longer. That was when he commanded it to stop smoldering, and then he would move on to the next thing, be it an enemy with a gun or an enemy that had the power to kill those he loved. The engines of the other airship started to roar, he vaguely felt, but then he made it burn, too. Then an explosion, and everything burned. Even himself. The black flames around him protected him, and they burned for a moment too, until they cut through the existence of the orange-red heat covering him and the fallen men around him. The smoke covered everything and hid his feet, even when he blasted himself in the air. He felt himself moving by the quick, sharp whims of his flaming instincts; bullets, swords, clubs, lances, everything burned when they got too close to him, and then the attackers burned, too. At some point he realized he was laughing while everything else was screaming and moaning, and at some point it grew silent as the men died and the ships burned. He continued to laugh, even as the city erupted into noise and exchanged fire. Nothing could surpass his fire. Nothing. He felt the rush of supremacy and power in his chest, and he continued to laugh as he razed the entire shipyard. Exhaustion hit him when everything was over. He fell to his knees and opened his eyes without the film of flames covering them, and realized that his job was done. There were no flames licking around him because everything that had caught fire had died. Around him were charred bones, countless discarded weapons, twisted and melted steel and the endless ocean of smoke as dark as the tar-night. The smoke danced and rose around him like snakes, even following his trembling arms as he looked down at his unscarred hands. The two ships were annihilated and the shipyard looked as if it had been bombed. Judging by the amount of weapons and torn cloaks around him, there must have been hundreds. He must have killed hundreds. Triumph rushed through him, and that pride made him sick. He fell to his hands and tried to vomit or even to cry, but nothing came to him. All he felt was the pride of winning a battle, and an uncontrollable laugh. Then a noise like another great explosion made him jerk his head upwards, and the smell of new fire. He looked up, squinting through his throbbing eyes, to see an airship landing to the west, outside of the walls of the city. Behind that one landing airship – cloaked in blue, just as the ones he had destroyed – an entire fleet of others came from behind it, both from the east and the south. Enemies. An entire fleet of enemies, landing at the city he was supposed to have just saved. Another explosion, and another shot of visual flaming splendor. One of the airships still in the air had fired from its front, and the great black castle by the sea shook with another explosion. Vik’s mind felt sluggish and tired, but he was still conscious enough to realize that Vainia’s palace was under attack, and the airships must have noticed that the city was under inner siege. “No,” he croaked. “No. This can’t be. There’s no way we can do this… Not this amount of reinforcements. There’s no way…” His hands rose and pulled at his hair in distress. “Impossible…” The Inusian reinforcements had come from far off, and they had come in droves. There were at least five ships behind the one that had landed already, and even from this distance he could see that they were all crawling with bluecoats. Whether they were Inusian soldiers or the armies of the World Government that Cidolas had spoken of, they were coming to sweep the city and, apparently, to raze every enemy within it. All that awaited them was ruin… and no party of Vainia’s, even her elite, could stop the thousands that would soon be flooding into the city. Vik looked around fervently for some sort of defense. He had to act. Everything around him was smoking and destroyed, but he could see what appeared to be a set-up of barrels, artillery, and dark machinery at the perimeter of the shipyard, somehow smoking but not damaged. Anti-air support – that was something he could handle. If he could get those battleships out of the air before they got close enough to destroy the Black Castle, he would be able to save them. Karilyn, Cidolas, and the entire Eternal Corps depended on him, and Vik knew he couldn’t let them down. Not yet. It was difficult, but Vik swallowed his panic and fear as he started to run full speed towards the scattered AA near the walls of the shipyard. His legs buckled and his eyes felt heavy from the use of his power, but he ignored it and forced himself onward. As always, he felt the eyes of his father behind his own, cold and frigid and stern – but for the first time he felt Karilyn’s eyes within him as well, looking up at him from beneath her long eyelashes, occasionally looking away but always turning back up at him. He had to see them again. He was two paces away from the AA turrets when the world erupted into flames again. It was the Crystal that saved his life. The instincts that allowed him to see the cannon less than a second away from him also immediately engulfed him in flames, pitch black emperor-flames that protected him from the explosion of the entire shipyard. ‘Of course,’ he scolded himself as he went flying in the air, and his vision left him, and his inner ears screamed just as loud as his muscles did. ‘Of course they could see the smoke around here. Of course they saw the ships being destroyed. They knew I was here. They know, they know everything…’ Vik was not sure how much time had passed when he rose again, but he knew that he had been unconscious for some time. He was not harmed on the outside, but everything hurt inside, from his head to his eyes to his chest again. Black and silver melted wreckage of the turrets and the walls of the shipyard lay around him like twisted modern art in the shape of a corpse. Distant rumblings and crashings of falling shells tore through the earth and even caused the ground near him to regularly shake. Everything around him was aflame, even the skies. Once so black and dim they defied vision, now the skies bled scarlet and gray with exhaust and the rising of smoke and fire. He could hear the great noise of battle and slaughter from every direction. The whole city was screaming. “Damn it all!” he cried out, unable to control himself and unable to rise to his feet without buckling. He dared not look at the black towers to his side, near the ocean. What if he had failed? What if the tower had fallen, and everyone in it was…? No. That kind of thinking would get him nowhere. He had to think of what to do next, even if his ears were still ringing and his body still moaned for him to lie down and try to escape death. The plan had failed. They had not expected reinforcements. The Corps had likely fled, and Cidolas and Karilyn with them. Cidolas could probably find Vik at any time, since he still had the Crystal on his person… but that wasn’t enough. Vik had to go to them, and make sure they were alright. If he could see them again, and fight alongside them, then he would have no more regrets, even if they failed in escaping the city. Even if… Something drove him to his knees again as soon as he managed to get up. This something hurt, a hurt he hadn’t felt in too long. It was piercing, sharp, and took his breath away. He felt heat run down his body in a different way than his black flames. Vik looked down to see blood rippling through his shirt, as bright red and arresting as the fire on the horizon. ‘What? What is this? What?’ It was all he could do to let a hand drift to his lower left abdomen, where the blood was spiraling out from. He had been shot from behind, and the wound continued all the way to his front. It hurt suddenly and out of nowhere, making him gasp and tremble in agony. It was a rifle bullet, undoubtedly, from how harsh and sharp the pain was. Vik turned in shock, trembling all over, to see where the source of the bite had come from. A woman, aiming a great rifle to her eyes. She was short and curvy even through her uniform. She stood alone, aiming her gun at him, and he could see glimpses of dark skin from between the folds of her military uniform. Behind her, the outline of a great force rose – an army, advancing in every direction, in cloaks almost as dark as the blue of Inusia. Their uniforms were identical to hers, beneath their cloaks. Something about the woman felt familiar – yet malicious. Vik looked back at her, his hands groping at his wound. For a moment he could see his wide, golden eyes reflected in the scope of her rifle… and he could feel her looking right back at him, right into his eyes, right into his soul. There were three eyes staring at him from within, now: his father’s, Karilyn’s, and this enemy, poised to take his life. He opened his mouth to speak, to curse, to lament, but the breath was punched out of it again. This time it was in his chest. The woman’s barrel exploded with light again, and he saw the bullet coming with his unnatural Tyrant eyes. The Crystal flared in heat at the side of his leg, within the cargo pocket of his ripped pants. The bullet advanced slowly, slowly, and he could not move. The eyes had paralyzed him, within and without. He could not move, even as the bullet burst into his chest and back out behind him. Another explosion. This time, from within. He felt less of himself than before, and felt more of the flames. As Vik rose, roared, and leapt forward, inside he felt himself curling into a ball and being embraced by the most comforting warmth he had ever felt in his life. It felt good to give in and let his instinct take control. It felt good to burn everything, even himself. Distantly, at the very ends of his cleaved senses, he could tell that the flames were hurting him this time – perhaps because they were stronger than ever. He could assess the strength of his flames by the speed at which the things he burned were silenced. Bodies, steel, concrete, even air, all of it died faster than ever. Curled up within himself, he felt a weight on his arms, like something hanging from one of them. He did not have the energy to brush it off, so he let himself rampage with it still clinging to him. Nothing could stop him. In his retreated state he clenched his eyes shut and tried to ignore the pain pulsing from behind the scar on his eyebrows, but he could hear the devastation he was causing as if it were just behind a door he was blocking. He could feel himself rising and falling great distances in the air as if he were cargo on an airship doing midair maneuvers. His chest hurt, and his stomach, but even that pain faded away behind the screams and the fire. Vik tried to open his eyes from time to time, but each time he was defeated by his exhaustion and the pain of what he experienced when he got a glimpse of his senses. The screaming only intensified, and the burning seared every nerve of his body. He roared and writhed in anger and pain at once. The shelling from the circling airships had intensified as well, likely because he had managed to go deeper in the city. Every time he opened his eyes for his consciousness again, Vik noticed he was closer to the Black Castle. Each time, he retreated into the berserk power of the Crystal of Fire quicker than the last, afraid of opening his eyes in the midst of ruins and corpses. “Burn them,” he was whispering to himself. Vik looked up from his fetal position only to see himself, standing, looking down on him with purely golden eyes and blackened sclera. As soon as he looked up, everything was peaceful and suddenly silent. Nothing hurt anymore. Nothing made him cry anymore. There was only the darkness around him, the darkness in the eyes of his “other”, and the dark flames rising from the white-haired other Vik. “Let me burn them,” he repeated, holding out his hand to the prone, normal Vik. “Give up your body to me. Let me burn them, and let yourself burn out in the doing. Let yourself be reborn to your true body.” He realized this was not him. This was a man that looked just like him, but not. He wore an outlandish yet regal looking outfit that looked out of place in every way, from the odd luster of his clothes to the ridiculous adornments and too-large or too-tight aspects of the outfit. This Vik had long, wavy hair, like Vik’s own if he had never cut it in his life… but it was white as snow, and danced in the wind-less air like the flames rising from every angle of the stranger’s body. There was no scar over this Vik’s eyebrows. He looked just as young as Vik was, but his eyes looked so wise, so vicious, yet so sorrowful, that he must have been incredibly old. No one Vik’s age could have eyes as sorrowful as this shadow’s, not even Vik himself. Vik pushed himself off the ground. Nothing on his body hurt anymore. If anything, as he looked up to the flaming version of himself, and slowly stretched his hand out, he felt better and more whole than he ever had before… Then the vision was gone as soon as it began, and Vik was in his own pained, screaming body again. Everything was silent all over again, save for the distant rumbling of the battlefield-city. Every flame around him was extinguished save his own – and when those faded as well, Vik fell to his knees, sighing out black smoke. His chest and stomach hurt, but did not paralyze him with pain as before. His left hand patted at the wounds gingerly. After a quick inspection, he realized that the wounds had, somehow, already healed, for the most part. The familiar weight of the Crystal on his immobile knees was reassuring, as was the fact that he was still alive, though in more pain than he had been since the fight with Silverius. Then he looked around, and began to soundlessly weep. Only death surrounded him. More than at Icarun, more than in the shipyard, and more than in his worst nightmares. Broken, shattered, and blackened remains were littered around him in every direction. The wind blew, and bodies everywhere dissolved partially to ash in the winds. He was literally on his knees on a hill of corpses and bones. Buildings had fallen apart, burned and looking as if they had exploded, and jutted out of the earth around him like tombstones, all on unnatural and haphazardly damaged slants. Craters dotted the earth, and cobblestone was ripped up and thrown around in every direction. From what he could see, the devastation had continued in every direction, all through the streets and from the shipyard. The skies had never bled like this before, and like fog of the morning, black smoke persistently hung around every shattered window and every flaming car. He must have killed hundreds. Vik had never felt a pain like this before. He had nothing to say, nothing to moan or lament. All he had were the tears, his gaping mouth, and his burned, shaking arms. There was nothing inside that he could feel but a sense of profound loss, and emptiness. He had lost everything. He felt he had lost himself. Vikcent Hyusei could never be a monster on this level. This much killing was inhumane. He had lost humanity. He had lost his pureness, his duty, his righteousness. How could he call himself protecting anyone when he had ruined a city? Was he some demon now? A weapon? A tool of the Crystal? Was this what he was Chosen for? “No,” a voice croaked, right by his side. “No, please. Don’t cry anymore. Please…” The weight on his right arm. He had grown used to it, and forgotten that it was still there. It was heavy on his forearm, held close to his chest like he was holding onto something. Numbly, slowly, his body still aching everywhere, he turned to his right and looked at whoever had spoken on his arm. “It hurts…” He finally screamed with his tears when he saw what he carried. “No,” it was. “No. No. Why? This can’t be. Why? Who did this? Why me? How? No. No. No. No! No! No!” “Please, don’t cry,” croaked his little sister, still smiling a crimson grimace of concern. She reached up to caress his face with the only arm she still had. “I don’t like seeing you cry, big brother. It hurts.” She was ruined. He knew he had ruined her. Every bit of her beneath her hips had been blown off, likely burned, and beneath the skirt of her uniform – and all on his lower right side – was blood, a waterfall of it. Her left arm was both burned and shattered, broken and smashed and at an unnatural eighty-nine degree angle, most likely from being dragged about at supernatural speeds. Her right arm had been wrapped around Vik’s, and he had kept a grip around her chest that had left a clear burn scar, one that still smoked. Her eyes were vacant, almost glossed over, but they were undoubtedly his sister’s. That was undoubtedly Rosaria Hyusei’s face looking up at him. It was undoubtedly Rosaria Hyusei in his arms, broken, torn apart, and dying, on top of all the others already dead. “How? What are you doing here? How are you alive?” He shook violently and tried to touch her with his shaking hands. Every word was punctuated by a hiccup and a gasp as Vik struggled to breathe. This made no sense. This could not be. He must have been in the middle of another nightmare. He must never have woken up. “Kaiser,” Rosaria croaked, each breath drawing forth a bubble of blood. It was all Vik could do to lift her up and let the blood flow out of her mouth like a river, and he barely did it without vomiting. “I’m sorry. Don’t talk. Please. I’m sorry. Oh God…” “Kaiser,” she repeated, shivering. “He… killed father. Took me. Blinded me. I could see again. Eyes… golden eyes.” “Golden… eyes? The Tyrant? What? No. No.” He knew that name. Kaiser was the disguise of the Black Knight. “He… took you? Blinded you? But the military… How are you here? Rosaria…” “Controlled… I could see. Justice… He said, justice, Vik. Father cried.” “No, no, no, Rosaria… No… This can’t be…” “Oh, Vik… don’t cry. I can see you. I can see you again. So warm… You’re so warm. I missed it.” Vik was speechless as his sister deliriously tried to breathe her last in his arms. He had killed her. He had burned her, and everyone else. Father. Karilyn’s father. Karilyn. Cidolas. Jutenas. Silverius. Rosaria. Father. Rosaria. Fire. “No,” he whispered, looking in her eyes and knowing she could not see him. “Don’t. Don’t do this, Rose. Don’t. No… I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” He had lost control – and by the cruelest twist of fate possible, she had been the one in his line of sight. She had been the one to shoot him twice, back when she still sported eyes of gold. Now her eyes saw nothing. She stopped gasping and stopped moving. Her hand was frozen still caressing his face. ...End of Chapter Fifty-Three. <- Previous Page | Main Page | Next Page->